Louise Chandler Moulton, Poet and Friend

Mrs. Moulton's mastery of the sonnet has been alluded to before, but as each new volume brought fresh proof of it, and as she went on producing work equally important, it is impossible not to refer to this form of her art again and again. Whittier wrote to her after the appearance of "In the Garden of Dreams": "It seems to me the sonnet was never set to such music before, nor ever weighted with more deep and tender thought;" and Miss Guiney, in a review, declared that "we rest with a steadfast pleasure on the sonnets, and in their masterly handling of high thoughts." Phrases of equal significance might be multiplied, and to them no dissenting voice could be raised.

In 1890 Mrs. Moulton brought out a volume of juvenile stories under the title "Stories Told at Twilight," and in 1896 this was followed by another with the name "In Childhood's Country." Always wholesome, kindly, attractive, these volumes had a marked success with the audience for which they were designed; and of few books written for children can or need more be said.

Among the letters of this period are a number from a correspondent signing "Pascal Germain." The writer had published a novel called "Rhea: a Suggestion," but his identity has not yet been made public. Mrs. Moulton never knew who he was, but apparently opened the correspondence in regard to something which struck her in the book. Some clews exist which might be followed up were one inclined to endeavor to solve the riddle. After the death of Carl Gutherz, the artist who painted the admirable decoration "Light" for the ceiling of the Reading-room in the Congressional Library in Washington, his daughter found among the papers of her father a post-card signed Pascal Germain, and written from Paris in the manner of a familiar friend. Evidently Mr. Gutherz had known the mysterious writer well, but the daughter had no clew by which to identify him.

A letter from Edward Stanton Huntington, author of "Dreams of the Dead," rather deepens than clears the mystery. The writer was a nephew of Bishop Huntington, and is not now living.

Mr. Huntington to Mrs. Moulton"Wollaston, Mass.December 8, 1892.

"My Dear Mrs. Moulton: I find myself unable to send the complete letters of my friend, Duynsters, but take pleasure in sending you the extracts referring to Pascal Germain. After the receipt of his letter (enclosed) dated June 1st, I wrote him of the conversation you and I had in regard to 'Rhea' and the merits of the book. I also mentioned the photograph. He replies:

"'What you tell me of the photograph and Mrs. Moulton amuses me very much. Let me assure you that the photograph is no more the picture of Pascal Germain than it is of Pericles, or Gaboriau, or Zoroaster. I am the only human being who knows the identity of Germain, beside himself, and no one can possess his photograph.'

"Duynsters then goes on to discuss the symbolism and sound psychology of the work. My own conclusion, after reading the words of my friend Duynsters, and hastily perusing 'Rhea,' (I confess I was not much interested in the book)—my conclusions are that Germain is the pen name of some man or woman of peculiar genius and eccentric taste.

"Mr. Duynsters is a very cultivated man, one who has travelled extensively, and who has a keen judgment of men and affairs; so it puzzles me exceedingly to decide who this author of 'Rhea' really is. Time will tell...."

A copy of "Rhea" was among Mrs. Moulton's books, but the novel seems never to have made a marked impression on either side of the Atlantic. What is apparently the earliest letter remaining of the series seems to throw light on a passage in the note of Mr. Huntington, and to give the impression that Pascal Germain had played a mischievous trick on Mrs. Moulton by sending her a photograph which was not genuine.

M. Germain to Mrs. MoultonMonastery of Ste. Barbe,Seine Inférieure, France.

Madame: It is in sincere gratitude that I tender you my thanks for your kind words about the photograph which I had many misgivings in venturing to lay before you, fearing it might be de trop. Whether you really forgive me for sending it, or were so gentle as to conceal your displeasure, it leaves me your debtor always. Although I write from Paris now, the above is my address, and I beg you will remember it if at any time I can serve you on this side of the ocean. I beg you to command me freely.

Believe me to remain,Yours very faithfully,Pascal Germain.From the sameParis. Tuesday Morn.

Dear Friend: I am inexpressibly touched by your letter, and I reply at once. I drop all other work to write to you, solely that I may lose no time. Yours of the 1st has been here only a few minutes. Believe me, your idea of death is purely a fancy, born of an atmosphere of doubt, out of which you must get as soon as possible. I am glad you wrote, for in this I may serve you as I have served others.

When I tell you I feel sure your phantom of approaching death is unreal, I am telling you a truth deduced from hard study, and than which no other conclusion could arrive. Of this I give you my most sacred assurance. Put this thought out of your mind as you would recoil from any adverse suggestion. The fact is, very few deaths are natural: they are the result of fear. The natural death is at the age of from a hundred to a hundred and twenty or thirty years. The deaths about us are from fright, ignorance, and concession to the opinions of uneducated friends, and half-educated doctors. This I know. I could cite you case after case of those who have really died because the physician asserted they could not live.

If your delusion is mental, swing to the other side of the circle, and read or study the most agreeable things that are widely apart from what you have been dwelling upon. Exercise strengthens the mind. It is the folly of fools to speak of the brain being over-worked. It may be stupidly exercised, but if used in a catholic development, the use makes it more vigorous. Look at the blue sky; not the ground. God is the Creator, but man is also a creator. His health depends largely on his will,—that is to say, in the sense of that will being plastic to the Divine will.

If your illness is physical stop thinking about yourself,—do as Saint Teresa did, take up some other subject, and suddenly you will find yourself well. Nature requires only a few months, not years, to make the body all over again.

Death is natural. Few physicians know anything about it. They have shut down every window in their souls to the light. For your comfort let me tell you that what I am saying is the subject of a long talk with one of the first physicians on the Continent.

Many things, accepted by the common people to be the result of miracle, are really the result of thought. That is, of mental force, used or misused. Don't misuse your forces. Read Plato if you have been reading too much modern fiction, or have been dipping too deep into Wittemberg's philosophy. It seems to me there can be no doubt of the survival of the individual soul. Why not plant your feet on the facts we possess, and on faith, and philosophy? Read your "Imitatione Christi." It fits every mind by transposing the symbolism. I tell you frankly that even if no such man as Jesus ever lived, I can be serene with Plato's guidance and light.

Stop critical reading. Really a critic is an interpreter, but what modern critic knows this? The only modern critic I honor is Herbert Spencer.

Believe me,Yours with great respect,Pascal Germain.From the same17, Avenue Gourgard (Monceau), Paris,September 13, 1890.

My Dear Mrs. Moulton: I hope you have believed that all this while I have been away my letters were not forwarded and only now can I thank you for the beautiful volume you have sent me.

I have wandered through it reading over and over special poems that fascinate me. I have not really read them all yet, though I ought to know this volume very well, for I bought it some years ago. I am particularly pleased with the poems, "A Painted Fan," and "The House of Death." The poem called "Annie's Daughter" is picturesque to a great degree. By the way I have a letter from an American magazine asking me to write for them "anything." The letter is in French. Now why should I not write for them an article on your poems? They tell me they will faithfully translate all I send. Your informant was right. I am French only on one side of the house. Lest I may forget, I want to say here and now how much I like your "At Étretat." I should have known it meant that place, even without the title. The picture is so vivid. Do you know the Riviera? There is material for you in grays and browns, and the sound of the sea. But I think the poetry of the "fan" expresses you best, and there you have the advantage of being alone in your beautiful thought. What lonely things beauty, truth, and the soul are! The atoms never touch.

Forgive the length of this if you can, and believe me,

Your faithful servant,Pascal Germain.From the same17, Avenue Gourgard (Monceau), Paris,December 24, 1891.

Madame: I trust it will not displease you to hear from me again, though my fate is perilously uncertain, since not from you, nor from any mutual friend, can I be sure that my "Rhea" has not fallen under your displeasure. But I offer something more welcome to your poet's hands than any work of mine. The laurel which I enclose is from the casket of dear Owen Meredith. You may have seen in the newspapers an account of the brilliantly solemn funeral, when honors were paid him which only before have been paid to the Chief Marshals of France; and how through all that pomp and pageantry, but one laurel wreath rested on his casket,—the crown laid upon his beloved clay by his wife.

There was a good deal of talk about this wreath, though no one but Lady Lytton and the sender knew from whence it came. It was I—yet not altogether myself,—for it was a late (too late) atonement for an undelivered message of love and thanks to the author of "Lucile" sent to him by a dear friend of mine, a Sister of Charity.

Lord Lytton's death was, as you know, sudden, and my message was unwritten because I had only returned to Paris after years of travelling, and I was simply waiting for better news of him in order to go to the Embassy with the story of her life, and what the ideal woman in the poem had done for the heroine in the flesh, when the startling news of his death came. I did what I thought the dear Sister would like done, since words were useless. One might quote his own words,

Soul to soul,

since from my hands to the poet's wife the laurel was laid upon him; and I send it because it has a touch of the supernatural; of the mystical love and sweetness of your own domain,—and is no common occurrence, that, out of all the wreaths and tokens, sent by kings and queens and nobles, from all over the world, the one alone from a Sister of Charity, was laid upon his casket from the first, in the death-chamber, in the church, and in the sad procession, and finally buried with him at Knebworth. For I must explain that not till a fortnight afterward did Lady Lytton know that the laurel crown was not my gift alone. It was purely as my gift that she generously favored it above all others.

She was profoundly touched when I told her the story, and only last Sunday she wrote and asked me if she might some day give it to the public, to which, of course, I assented. I am therefore breaking no confidence in sending these few leaves which I plucked from the wreath after it was woven. As they had faded I regilded them, as you see. (Laurels and gold for poets.) Nor is this boldness all mine. It is my artist friend, Monsieur Carl Gutherz, who bids me send them to you, "because," he says, "they will weave into her fancies in some sweet and satisfying dream."

Madame, believe me,Your faithful servant,Pascal Germain.

Among the Moulton books now in the collection in the Boston Public Library is a 16mo copy of Bernardin de Saint-Pierre's "Paul et Virginie," bound in an old brocade of a lovely hue of old-rose. On its cover obliquely is to be seen the faintest shadow of a cross, and in it is preserved the following letter:

M. Germain to Mrs. MoultonParis, Wednesday.

My dear Mrs. Moulton: The little book is not quite what I was looking for. The binding I was searching for I did not find, but if I delay too long, I shall be away to Madrid; not the place most likely to reward my search.

I wonder if you will like the odd cover? It was ordered by me in an impulse without stopping to reflect that its associations to me mean nothing to you. The bit of tapestry is the relic of one of the oldest and most picturesque chambers in Normandy, and was given me by a nun who nursed me through an illness there—in fact I begged her for it because it is interwoven with a story which I think my best (not yet finished). If you hold the book so that the light plays horizontally, you will see the trace of time-wear in the shape of a †. The fabric was the vestment more than a hundred years in the service of the church there, and was worn by the hero of my story—a priest whose life was a long agony—for a fault nobly atoned. But I must not assume your interest in the tragedy. Perhaps the color—which an artist friend borrowed to robe one of his angels in—may please you. If not, kindly burn the packet, as it has been consecrated—the fabric, not the book;—for I owe the giver the courtesy of conforming to the old Catholic (nay, Egyptian, for the matter of that) rule to burn all sacred things when their day is done.

No doubt the cover does not look professional. I got it done at short notice by one not used to my sometimes eccentric requests and wishes. Will you kindly give it value by accepting it with the best wishes of

Your very faithful,Pascal Germain.

So these letters remain, with their curious suggestiveness.

Mrs. Moulton's memorial volume on Arthur O'Shaughnessy was published in 1894,—a volume containing selections from his poems preceded by a biographical and critical introduction. Mrs. Spofford pronounced the book "an exquisite piece of work, full of interest and done with such delight in touch." Mrs. Moulton had written with her accustomed skill, and through every line spoke her intimate sympathy with the poet and with his work.

Her summers, after the visit to her daughter in Charleston, were still passed in Europe. Rome, Florence, and other southern cities were often visited before she went to England for her annual London season. Often, too, she made a stay in Paris either before or after her sojourn on the other side of the Channel. Among her friends in Paris were Marie Bashkirtseff and her mother, and not infrequently she took tea at the studio. After the death of the artist, a number of letters passed between Mrs. Moulton and the heart-broken mother.

Her friends in London were so many, and the diary records so many pleasant social diversions that it is no wonder that Thomas Hardy should write to her: "Why don't you live in London altogether? You might thus please us, your friends, and send to America letters of a higher character than are usually penned. You would raise the standard of that branch of journalism." Season after season she notes dinners, luncheons, drives, functions of all sorts, and one does not wonder that with this and her really arduous literary work her health began to suffer. A German "cure" came to be a regular part of the summer programme, and yet with her eager temperament and keen interest in the human, she could not bring herself to forego the excitement and enjoyment which probably did much to make this necessary.

Not a little did her voluminous correspondence add to the strain under which she lived. Continually in her diary are entries which show how heavy was the task of keeping up with the flood of correspondence which constantly flowed in at her doors. "Letters, letters, letters to answer. Oh, dear, it seems to me that the whole of my life goes in writing letters. I wrote what seemed necessary letters till one p.m. Oh, what shall I do? These letters are ruining my life!" "Letters all the morning." "Letters till luncheon." Her acquaintance was wide, and her relations with the literary world of her day made it inevitable that she should be called upon for large epistolary labors; but added to this was the burden, already alluded to, of the letters which came to her from strangers. She was too kindly to ignore or neglect these, and she expended much of her strength in answer to calls upon her which were unwarrantably made. Against the greater amount of literary work which she might have accomplished with the force thus generously expended, or the possible days which might have been added to her life, must in the great account be set the pleasure she gave to many, and the balance is not for man to reckon.

It is now well known that the poems published over the name "Michael Field" were written by Miss Bradley and Miss Edith Cooper in conjunction. To Miss Cooper, Mrs. Moulton, in the intimacy of a warm friendship which established itself between them, gave in loving familiarity the name "Amber Eyes." Many letters were exchanged, and from the correspondence of Miss Cooper may be quoted these fragments.

Miss Cooper to Mrs. Moulton

"We have just returned from Fiesole and Orvieto, and such names are poems. I had hoped to send you verses in The Academy, welded by Michael, on some Greek goddess in the British Museum. We very much care for the sympathy and interest of Americans."

"I don't know any poet who is so spontaneously true to himself as you are. I actually stand by you as I read, and see the harmonious movement of your lips, and the half-deprecating, half-shadowed look in your eyes.... Your verses are like music. What is this? You are not able to sing? Is this the effect of Boston on its winter guest? I can sympathize, for I have not written a line since our play was brought out last October."

"The placid hills [in the Lake Country] make one love them as only Tuscan hills besides can do. Some of the greatest ballads belong here. Wordsworth, Scott, and Burns, and many song-writers have given their passion to this country-side, where one has such joy as the best dreams are made of."

"In a cover somewhat like this paper in tone 'Stéphanie' presents herself to you.... We have the audacity to think it is nearly as well woven as one of the William Morris carpets. We have taken ten years over the ten pages."

On one of her visits to the cure at Wiesbaden Mrs. Moulton made the acquaintance of Friedrich von Bodenstedt and visited at his house. She characterized the lyrics of the author of the "Lieder des Mirza-Schaffy" as "warm with the love of life and the life of love, and perfumed with the roses of the East." Her description of his personal appearance is not without interest.

"A tall, handsome, active man of seventy-two, with gray hair, with eyes full, still, of the keen fire of youth; with the grand manner which belongs to the high-bred gentlemen of his generation, and the gift to please and to charm which is not always the dower even of a poet."

Her return voyage from Europe in 1891 was a sorrowful one. Just before sailing she notes in her diary: "A sad day,—a telegram in the morning to say that mother was failing." On the day before the steamer made land she writes: "A lovely day, but I am so anxious as to what news of my poor mother awaits me to-morrow"; and the first entry on shore is: "Landed to learn that my dear mother died last Monday, October 26, and was buried Tuesday. Oh, what it is to know that I shall never see her again!"

The letters of Mrs. Moulton show through these years a growing feeling in regard to the mystery of death. So many of her friends had gone that the brevity of life was more and more deeply impressed upon her. In the correspondence of many of her friends are traces that her letters to them, not now available, had touched upon the questions to her so vital. Mrs. Maxwell (Miss M.E. Braddon) for instance, wrote:

Mrs. Maxwell to Mrs. Moulton

"I have never believed in the gloomy and pitiless creed of the Calvinists. I believe every one is master of his destiny so far as perfect freedom of choice for good or evil. When we take the wrong road we do it perhaps in the blindness of passion, with eyes blind to consequences, minds darkened by selfish desires, by vanity, false ambitions, and by weakly yielding to bad influences."

Canon Bell to Mrs. Moulton

"I hope you are seeing your way clearly to faith in God and His dear Son. A sure trust in our Heavenly Father is the only true consolation in this world of change and sorrow. That brings peace."

Lady Henry Somerset to Mrs. Moulton

"I well understand what you say about looking onward. I think our eyes are turned that way when the steps of life lead us nearer to the journey's end with each setting sun. It is absorbingly interesting. Yes, I believe the love of God will be closest; and, in the last, victorious."

What the words were to which these were replies may in part be gathered from the following:

Mrs. Moulton to William WinterDurnham House, Chelsea, London,October 3, 1894.

Dear Willie: I hope your lecture last night was a success, but it seems to me that all you do is. Yes,—how well I remember that seventieth-birthday breakfast to Dr. Holmes. We sat very near each other, you and I, and I know how your words moved me, as well as how they moved Dr. Holmes. I felt his death very keenly, but I knew him far less than you did. To know him at all was to love him. How strange that you should have written of so many great pilgrims into the unknown. Thank God for your immortal hope. To me the outlook darkens as I draw nearer and nearer to the end. I am appalled by the immensity of the universe, and the nothingness of our little human atom among the infinite worlds. But God knows what is to come. You are happier than most in the love that surrounds you.

Thank you a thousand times for your dear letter. If I go to New York or you come to Boston, do not let us fail to meet, for the time in which earthly meetings are possible is short. Oh, how I hope there may be a life to come in which we shall find lost loves and hopes, and above all, lost possibilities. I think it is hardest of all to me to think what I might have been, might have done, and to be so utterly discontented with myself as I am. If you pray, say a prayer sometimes for one of the truest and fondest of your many friends,—this wanderer,

L.C.M.

Without doubt the state of Mrs. Moulton's health had much to do with her apprehensions in regard to a future life, and no one who was intimately associated with her could fail to know that these expressions of gloom and foreboding, while entirely genuine at the moment of their utterance, convey an impression of her usual state of mind far more dark than was warranted by the truth. She was too sincerely interested in life and friendship, too much of her time and thought went to earnest work, however, for her to be in general either brooding or fearsome. The extracts given rather indicate her attitude of mind toward certain grave questions than toward life in general.

The frankness of the following letter from a woman who possessed remarkable powers which the public never fully appreciated is striking and refreshing:

Mrs. Richard Henry Stoddard to Mrs. MoultonMattapoisett, January 20.

Dear Mrs. Moulton: Will you accept Mr. Stoddard's thanks for your pleasant notice through me? I write nearly all his personal letters, I may say, nearly all except business letters. He was always averse to letter writing, and since his blindness this aversion is increased; he hurts and angers many without meaning to do so.

I think your first quotation a very poor one. The value of reviews or notices seems to me to be in quotations rather than in the ordinary criticism. In reading them I have often taken the poems in a new and striking light; the medium—that is, the writer—has instructed and cleared my understanding. The happiest in regard to "The Lion's Cub" is the extract in The Critic. There has been no review of the book; the nearest, so far, is the Springfield Republican's and that is suggestive of a review. Mr. Stoddard considers the book a failure; I doubt if he ever collects again. Boyle O'Reilly once said that he saw Stoddard in Broadway and that no one noticed him; "had he been in Boston," he continued, "on Washington Street, every man's hat would have been off to his white head."

We are most delightfully set aside from the afternoon teas of the city, though the invitations chase us up here; the gray tranquil waters of our little bay, the solitary street, a dog occasionally going by, sometimes a man, is a pleasing contrast to 15th Street and Broadway. We shall remain a few days longer and then go into our incongruous life again. If Lorimer were acting in Boston as he did for the past three winters, we should go home that way, but as he has not been there this season we shall not appear.